Evicted From Eternity_ The Restructuring of Modern Rome - Michael Herzfeld [187]
While the bailiff had to respect certain norms-he could not attend the press conference that the residents were preparing for 15 May, for examplehe could continue to comment informally on their strategies for raising public awareness, and he remained firmly opposed to evicting anyone who was old or ill. The bank's lawyer's position was less clear. It is not clear whether his apparent complaisance should be attributed to simple personal kindliness or to his desire to protect the bank's reputation from a major public embarrassment; the day before there had been a hearing for the nonagenarian, which resulted in an extension of her right to remain in her apartment, but the tension that this sensationalist aspect generated had not entirely abated. Indeed, the lawyer's stance may have been motivated by both concern for the bank's good name and some degree of humanitarian decency; like the prefect, he had every interest in trying to keep all parties reasonably calm, if not exactly content. Unseemly haste would have gained the bank nothing at all. The government usually announces general extensions of eviction deadlines at Christmas and Easter as well as during elections. The bank's best prospect was therefore simply to acquiesce in a whole series of delays in the hope that eventually a window of real opportunity would appear.
The polite exchange between the bailiff and the bank's lawyer was a jousting match between two contestants whose goals nevertheless partly overlapped. Paolo's description of the negotiations that preceded the final decision is succinct and revealing; its highly generic character shows that here again there is a set piece in which all concerned knew how to play their respective parts. For every time an eviction was due, Paolo explained, the bailiff presented himself at the prefect's office along with a doctor (whose presence is required by law) and an ironworker who would bar the door once the tenants had been evicted. This group assembled in the prefect's office; the bailiff then asked the police commander if he "had officers available to carry out the eviction," and the prefect replied that he did not. "See you next time!" came the by now ritualized response, there was a formal leavetaking, and then the bailiff signaled from the window-apparently with no attempt at secrecy-waving his arms crossways but in opposite directions to indicate that nothing would happen.
Paolo who, as the tenants' representative, was waiting downstairs on the street, now called the other tenants on his cell phone to reassure them that they could relax; then he greeted the officials as they come out of the building and invited them all to coffee-a clear declaration of social accommodation-after which he took off for the palazzo on his motorbike. There the bailiff and the police officer assembled with the tenants for the formal signing of the extension of the deadline-the scene that I have just described. That, at least, was the pattern until the final, dread moment of actual eviction arrived. In Via degli Ibernesi, that moment was still in the future. But there was one ominous new sign this time around: it was the first occasion on which a policeman, albeit as sole representative of the force, accompanied the bailiff back to the palazzo.
The bank could afford to wait. Existing alliances were already distinctly frayed. Not only did residents of more left-wing orientation view the growing involvement of the Alleanza nazionale in the Via degli Ibernesi case with deep misgivings, but the residents in the palazzo were equally diffident in their dealings with the growing tide of leftist-organized protests over the housing emergency. The representatives of the tenants' association also differed with the residents over whether to compromise if suitable housing could be found elsewhere; the residents wanted to remain in Monti and together.
Internally, too, there were moments of tension over basic questions